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How to consistently breed the
best cattle
____________________________________________________
By: JOHN DEVONPORT
Recently, we were privileged and humbled to be awarded the
SA Champion of Champions Show Cow Devlan Kelly with eight
strong Interbreed Gold Cup winners competing at Nampo/Alfa
2024, judged by well-known international judge PJ Budler.
We were also honoured to have bred three of the female
finalists & two of the bull finalists.
Where it all started?
Tracey and I met at Wits when we were both writing our last
exams, and she walked
past my Triumph Spitfire and popped the question,
“Would I like to swop cars?”
I
responded,
“No ... but could we swop telephone numbers.”
We were married four years later in June 1985 and blew all
our savings on our honeymoon.
We owned two cars, our degrees, and a good upbringing from
our devoted parents.
In November 1988, we purchased our first 205-hectare farm on
the Vaal dam.
In those days, we went to our bank manager Mr Dorling at
Standard Bank, and raised a R150 k overdraft over a cup of
tea. That and a loan from our parents helped fund the
purchase of the farm.
Tracey had a
much bigger vision than I, and over the years we managed to
acquire six more adjoining farms, and it now comprises 1350
hectares and 20 kms of waterfront an hour from Johannesburg.
The farms are all held in Trusts as they are growth assets
and can be passed down from generation to generation,
avoiding onerous taxes. We are merely the custodians of the
land.
A huge
advantage is that our farms are drought-resistant & expand
in size when the water recedes with nutritious, fertilized
grazing that appears after the first rains. The other big
advantage is that we have water rights, which took 15 years
to register and legitimise. Two
40-hectare centre pivots were developed on the best soils of
the farm with a pump on a pontoon at the deepest access
point, when the water stops flowing, and the dam drops to
very low levels. It is currently below 30 % full and at this
point a far cry from when 2 & half years ago it was 120 %
full.
This enables us
to produce maize and silage (your two biggest input costs
when raising a pedigree herd) at half the market price.
These two competitive advantages make the cattle operation
sustainable, profitable, and bulletproof.
On our original
farm, we could have started a khaki-bos factory because
there were so many weeds. Cattle ate weeds, and hence we
purchased our first American Grey Brahmans in 1990 after
burning & cleaning the farm.
We acquired our
first Limousin bull Baron VD903 from Oom Willie Van Eden in
1992 and crossed them with the commercial Brahmans. The
hybrid vigor of this cross was utterly amazing, and we
regularly won ‘slag os’ and ‘best of four’ at Vereeniging,
organized by Karoo Osche and Rassie Lombard, against some
stiff competition.
It was the Limousin bull
that did the job, and we fell in love with this
impressive-looking animal, which bred so well. We
subsequently bought three young Limousin heifers, and Devlan
Stud was born.
We increased
our herd at various dispersal sales and were impressed by a
young bull we bred that had shown potential.
We attended the
Bloem show in 1997 with this young gun, who was put on one
side of the show ring. Naively, we thought he had
won his class, but eventually he
was thrown out of the ring!
It was a big wake-up call for
us, and we realised we were in
desperate
need of help!
Finding a mentor
We were introduced to Mr Chris Marais, who lectured at the
Potch Agricultural College, by the then President, Mr Willem
Pistorius. Chris put cattle breeding into perspective:
He started by looking at the ARC book of all the different
breeds and looking at the average weights of the SA Limousin
breed.
The main goal was to breed animals suited to your
environment that were well adapted
to the Vaal dam and hit the above weights on average. Some
would be smaller, some
bigger, but to avoid the extremes of too big and too small.
Middle of the road and well-balanced, Animals were the
answer. Weigh your growing animals regularly so you can
gauge where you are with those targeted weights.
He also looked at functionally efficient animals based on
skew jaws, walking ability, hooves & legs, bad udders and
testes, sausage-looking animals with no capacity, bad
temperament, loins & top lines, and infertile animals with
the wedge the wrong way, and looking at our fertility
records. Many large Limousin herds have average
inter-calving records of between 370 and 380 days.
Females had to be feminine and fertile; bulls must be
masculine and have muscle.
He culled one-third of our herd and made them commercial
animals with his strict selection policy. It was a very
tough financial decision, and a lesson well learned on how
to do things properly from a gentleman Master Cattleman!
In 1998, we took three animals
selected by
Chris to the Nationals in Bloem and won seven firsts. The
bug had bitten, and we were enthusiastic and inspired by
this success.
Chris, Johan
Fourie (the Society breed director at the time), & myself
were driving in a car after the show, and Chris remarked on
what a great show we had experienced. Johan brought us down
to earth with a huge bump;
“Ag nee, John
is net a poep in die wind!”
It was a true
remark at the time, and today, Johan, a long-time friend,
and I have a good laugh about it. Later, we learned that
hard-muscled animals did not get placed in the interbreed
ring. Animals – must be the right type, easy fleshing, and
early maturing, softer muscled with depth and capacity,
shorter on the leg & well adapted to Southern African
conditions.
Dr. Michael
Bradfield also had an influence on our herd using Breedplan
and scientific breeding methods. We were awarded the
Southern African Breeder of the Year award in 2006 and have
won the Limousin Cow Group of the Year on numerous
occasions. This is because of the fertility of our herd &
weighing our animals and submitting the weights regularly,
resulting in us being a 4.5-star Completeness of Performance
tested herd.
Attending the
annual Stockman’s School also helps one expand one's mind
with the latest trends & shortfalls in our SA beef industry.
Tracey & I attended this year and picked up many good points
which will help our herd going into the unknown future.
Highly
respected international judge PJ Budler was also there, and
it was great talking and listening to him. He has some very
novel, practical & commonsense ideas on cattle breeding
which were interesting & refreshing. Like Chris, he focuses
on adaptable, functionally efficient animals that must be
fertile. However, the ‘breath of fresh air’ was longevity,
which he places great emphasis on to make sure one is
profitable. If your old cows fall pregnant and produce a
live calf, they stay in the herd. Many Limousin cows produce
fifteen calves or more, which is a tremendous strength of
our breed. Replacement heifers are expensive to grow out and
to keep before they calve.
We currently
use Marius Barkhuizen, a respected Interbreed Judge, as a
sounding board and to get a second opinion about our show
animals.
Marius noticed
Devlan Kelly at the Parys Show 2024 and made her the Gold
Cup Winner. His comments, which were
vindicated was that she would be
very difficult to beat at Nampo/Alfa.
Artificial insemination (AI) & Embryo transfers
These are two methods to increase your genetic diversity
using top-quality animals. We openly acknowledge that we
have not been that successful when compared to other
Limousin breeders, and it has risks and can be expensive.
We have had success with AI and bred the influential bull
Devlan Stavely Hercules DK0343. He went on to be in sixteen
different herds and has bred over 350
progeny. Devlan
Geisha Girl DL1145 was AI’d with RE9319 (Uron x Cachou
combination bred by Norman Bauer) and became the National
Champion Female in 2019.
We normally do
AI on our heifers and use new genetics or old proven bulls
who consistently perform, with a 40 % conception rate (not
great).
Geisha Girl
bred an impressive bull, Devlan Lake DL1611, who sired
Amazing Grace DL19158 and Devlan Kelly DL21156, who was
crowned the SA Champion of Champions recently by PJ Budler.
PJ described
her as
“An incredible
animal, a female with a bright future, balanced, feminine,
and maternal, with enough muscle for a female without being
coarse. She has tremendous centre-body dimension, she is
sound, good feet and legs, flexible through her shoulder,
and follows with a good hind leg. Good foot quality,
beautiful udder on this female, nice and level udder floor,
abundant milk flow, beautiful teat size and placement, good
fore udder attachment as it blends nicely and snugly into
that body wall. She has height and width in her udder, and
when you see her move away, you will see her fullness of
udder to go with that meat and muscle.”
Embryo
transfers are done when you want to replicate top-quality
genetics in one year. Instead of producing one calf, you
could produce many calves with those genetics in the same
year.
The trick here is to prepare your recipients very well. One
should have a slightly better conception rate using fresh
embryos versus frozen embryos.
Unfortunately, we have not bred any animal of significance
using this method (using National Champions), and our
conception rates with the recipients have been
disappointing. Hence, there are risks, and it can be
expensive!
Inbreeding or line breeding?
Prof Frikkie Neser and Dr Michael Bradfield always believed
in genetic variation and no inbreeding whatsoever.
We have always followed this principle religiously.
However, PJ Budler and other successful breeders believe in
Line Breeding to replicate the good attributes of an animal.
The saying goes, 'if it’s successful, then it’s line
breeding; if it’s not successful, then it’s inbreeding.'
An interesting example is if you have a daughter and a
brother from the same sire, they both have 50 % genetics
from the same father.
50 % x 50 % = 25 % inbreeding if it is a failure, and line
breeding if it is a success!
25 % x 25 % = 6.25 % inbreeding, which is acceptable to
Breedplan.
We will do some selective line breeding in the future.
How do we do it?
It is a numbers game using the natural method! Breeding is
about numbers and statistics; the computer systems like
Breedplan analyse profitable traits and put that into
readable reports.
We try and breed with dominant cow families and strong
maternal lines that are pleasing to the eye.
By using well-adapted, functionally efficient, fertile
feminine cows with longevity, good capacity, and pairing
them with masculine, well-muscled bulls with good genetics,
you will achieve the following.
Per 100 females that conceive, you will wean 80 to 85 % live
calves and produce 2 or 3 exceptional animals.
These are the stats that work at Devlan!
It is the KISS principle, KEEPING it SIMPLE and STUPID!
By using the natural method and numbers, it works
consistently well!
So, if you have the grazing, may we suggest you increase
your herds to 50, 75, or 100 top-quality, feminine, fertile,
deep, broad, and functional cows that are well adapted to
your farm. Use masculine well-muscled bulls who have proven
themselves with reliable and predictable outcomes. This will
enable you to breed an exceptional animal consistently.
The ingredients
One dreams about breeding the perfect animal. It needs time
and patience, patience & more patience. Chris said, "John,
in your lifetime, you will never get there". Very wise words
from an experienced Stockman!
One has tremendous challenges, setbacks & heartbreak,
especially when you lose a good animal, and you are deeply
involved and connected to this ‘beautiful game’ of breeding
the best. Also, when your health does not play along and
affects your output. However, if you love & enjoy what you
do, you will be resilient, have perseverance & with passion
you will perform & have success. It is exhilarating when a
plan comes together!
We would like to acknowledge all consultants, farmers &
friends for their advice and help. Thank you for your
support at our auctions, it is an honour & privilege to be
on this breeding journey with you. To our wonderful farm
staff who have done the hard work and gotten the job done.
Finally, to Tracey, my beautiful Lady, who is so incredibly
successful in her own right. She was recently inducted as a
laureate of the Financial Hall of Fame at its inaugural
meeting in Canada. We have been ‘one’ together on this
amazing farming adventure. Thank you sincerely for your
love, caring, and kindness ... all this would not be
possible without you! |
